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Why Putin Needs to Win in Mariupol
On Putin’s Ideological War
Putin has announced his victory in Mariupol, despite evidence of military resistance still present in the city. Mariupol, a city of 500,000 residents has seen devastation unlike that of any other city in Ukraine, since Russia’s full-scale invasion on February 24 2022.
Hundreds were killed and hundreds of thousands were displaced. The city was devastated. It will go down as one of the European cities that were entirely destroyed in a war effort, alongside Minsk, Kyiv, Kharkiv, St. Petersburg (then Leningrad), Warsaw, and others.
Putin wanted a victory in Mariupol to bolster support for the War domestically, because of how horribly the war has gone. He needed this victory before the nation-wide Russian commemoration of the “Great Patriotic War,” how Russians remember World War II.
But why is the Great Patriotic War’s memory so important to Putin?
Putin looks back at Russia’s history to justify his rule and expansion. He points to the greatness of the USSR in the 1950s-70s. He points to the time when Crimea belonged to Russia. And he does it because all of this works in gaining favor with the Russian public.
Clearly, the Russian war effort against Nazi forces diverted Axis attention from Western forces. The Battle…
